The job bites and hours are a monster for Caragan

There are times Margaret Caragan works so late, she feels like a zombie. Perfect, really. Zombies being a big part of her work and all.

The former Vallejo and American Canyon resident is making inroads in the competitive world of special effects make-up, with a self-taught talent that's taking the 30-year-old to the Cinema Make-Up School

in Hollywood.

"It's a big deal," Caragan said earlier this week. "Everybody in the industry knows it."

Caragan, niece of recently retired Vallejo police officer Alan Caragan, got to rub head wounds and vampire bites with some Hollywood hotshots at the recent "Monster-palooza."

"Huge industry guys," said Caragan, excited not only about her upcoming class, but possibly other classes if she can gather some big cash via the fundraising site idiegogo.com.

The $1,000 scholarship she recently won is "enough to take one course," said Caragan, expecting to learn the fine out of special effects

prosthetics.

Caragan said this whole self-taught thing has its plusses and minuses after nine years. The experience is good when that applying for a job thing comes around.

"I have tons of experience," she said. "The bad side of being self-taught is that you can teach yourself bad habits no matter how many videos and books are out there. I am looking to learn how to do it better."

Prosthetics and "casualty" make-up are Caragan's strong points,

she said.

"I've done a lot of stuff with medical and horror," she said.

Caragan's also mastered shark bites, putting her talent to use on "Day of the Shark 3" for the Discovery Channel with a 15-inch "great white bite."

Having studied anatomy sculpture at the Academy of Arts University helped, Caragan said.

"You look at the shape and intensity of the injury and it's interesting on the eye," she said. "It

looks painful."

Yes, Caragan tends to analyze the special effects make-up when

watching a film.

"I'm also kind of like a kid. I can shut off and enjoy the movie,"

she said.

It's grand, Caragan said, when a zombie or vampire "looks like something that can actually grab and

kill you."

This whole Zombie obsession with filmmakers and film buffs runs parallel with a suffering economy, Caragan believed.

"Zombies are often a comment on the human things going on," she said. "When people feel bad and are losing their homes. That kind of thing. Zombies started really coming in 2001 when we were in a war and everything. Zombies reflect how people feel about themselves in their lives."

Sure, the zombie bubble will burst, Caragan said, laughing that "I'm riding it out. I will not turn

zombies down."

Vampires, she reasoned, are basically human's wish for "attractiveness

and power."

Vampires and zombies are a breeze in the special effects make-up world when compared to the art of aging

people.

"It has to look real with details and colors," Caragan said. "So age make-up is the most difficult. Zombies are the easiest. You can always add color and blood. With vampires, you can add veins. With old age, you have took like a real

human being."

Caragan has come a long way since she was 5 and watched Michael Jackson's "Thriller" video in awe. It's all about doing whatever you can to showcase your work.

"It's definitely who you know," Caragan said. "I've built a lot of relationships over time. It's like planting seeds and I've done it for nine years in the Bay Area."